


Spin Cycle

by lantadyme



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-02-07
Updated: 2011-02-07
Packaged: 2017-10-15 12:05:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,349
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/160659
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lantadyme/pseuds/lantadyme
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the end it's about more than time itself. It's about playing the game no matter what.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Spin Cycle

He goes through a lot of records. The labels end up all marked to hell in black magic marker, the vinyl itself warping and shifting from LOHAC's oppressive heat and the constant press of Dave's fingertips. Little dips and potholes smudge on them, the grooves smashed flat and disappearing in a vague impression of his own fingerprints, and then Dave has to lift them off the platter and toss them out like black frisbees into the lava. They're useless like that. They melt out there, little flashes of bright orange fire before the rest of the record sinks beneath the surface. Then he pulls another one out of his sylladex, the same exact record he'd just thrown aside except this one without the warps and the smashed grooves.

Give it an hour and it'll have to join its twin.

The magic marker always stays the same, though. He marks the places he needs to turn back to, the spots he'll return to again and again. He can spin time to his will, but missing a destination by two minutes is annoying enough, let alone an hour. It helps to be specific; to be right the first time. It's downright professional.

Bro's dubplates had always been marked in black.

When he thinks about time there's one thing that bugs him about it. He's the goddamn Knight of Time. He's supposed to have full mastery of it. And yeah, he can go back and finish loops and rake in all the money on the planet, but he's still not the master. He still doesn't rule it all. Maybe some future Dave will earn that title and then eventually he'll be that guy, but right now he only has half of the equation.

He doesn't go forward in time. He only spins back.

It nags at him. It feels like he's missing the bigger picture. What happens if he jumps to the end? Has he never done it because every time-twin that does ends up dead and split off into oblivion? It's a logical enough conclusion, but even that hanging possibility of future dead Daves doesn't stop his fingers from twitching on the vinyl on occasion, itching to spin clockwise instead of the opposite.

Counterclockwise. Fighting against time. Going back instead of embracing it and going forward.

 _Your time player,_ he asks Terezi, tossing out the topic as casually as he can. _Did he run around doing these fucking endless timeloops and shit? How the hell am I doing in comparison?_

She tells him he's about a thousand times cooler than her time player, which he already knew. He's a Strider; that's a given. But she isn't that close with the time girl anymore, so she's not sure how he's doing by comparison. Besides being unendingly cool, of course.

Great. Way to be useful, Terezi.

It takes a little effort and a lot of delicious red text, but eventually he gets her to cough up the Maid of Time's troll tag. He sits there in the vent heat of a massive lava flow and he eyes her account name on the insides of his iShades, weighing whether he actually wants to do this.

He's had enough people pulling him out of jams this whole session. First Bro with the meteor and of course Jade for getting him out of apocalypseville to begin with. His sprite, sideline-future Dave, plus every other Dave in existence that's come back to save his ass more times than he has infinite spare records. Sometimes he feels less like the Knight and more like the classic Disney damsel in distress, Cinderella stuck in her endless cursed sleep, drowning in the timestream and waiting for some generic handsome prince to pull her the fuck out of it all. Or something. He's ever seen Cinderella, he is way too cool for that shit.

In the end though, he figures it can't hurt to just get advice. He's not asking the troll girl to save his life. All he wants is a simple chat with her—topic: time shenanigans.

\-- turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering apocalypseArisen [AA] \--

TG: sup  
TG: got a quick question for you then ill scram   
AA: 0_0  
AA: i d0 n0t believe we have sp0ken bef0re   
TG: probably not unless this is the start of a really sweet and excellent partnership  
TG: some super slick future me all up in your grill trolling you backwards through time like half these troll assholes are doing  
TG: no offense if youre not of the asshole variety  
TG: still i think i have the freaky troll girl groupie quota filled at the moment and you already have the red text  
TG: dont need mine to max your ravenous synesthesia bar   
AA: y0u are 0ne 0f the humans c0rrect  
AA: i d0nt really see the p0int 0f talking with y0u  
AA: again n0 0ffense i simply see n0 p0sitive result in 0ur c00perati0n  
AA: y0u had a questi0n th0ugh   
TG: yeah im kinda rambling i guess  
TG: youre the troll time player right   
AA: yes  
AA: ah y0u are the human time player   
TG: sharp as a tack this one  
TG: knight and the maid just chatting over here its like the plot of every shitty fantasy romance novel  
TG: shes all grimy and fresh from the milking stool and he saunters up shining like the goddamn sun  
TG: takes your breath away man this is some high end literature right here   
AA: i think y0u are being a bit t00 f0rward   
TG: probably  
TG: look just ignore all that crap  
TG: half the time i dont even know what im saying anyway  
TG: how exactly did this time shit work for you   
AA: what precisely d0 y0u mean by that   
TG: like how did you do it  
TG: im gathering data here trying to get a feel for how this works outside of what ive been doing myself  
TG: do all time players get the same basic skillset   
AA: as far as i kn0w yes  
AA: and i kn0w quite a l0t since i am technically my 0wn sprite   
TG: no shit so am i  
TG: this is some freaky ass deja vu up in here  
TG: did you go back in time and pull your buddys dick out of the fire too  
TG: dont tell me this is a dime a dozen and it happens to every time player  
TG: ill have to prepare some fucking handle flips if thats true   
AA: n0 my situati0n was a rather specific l00ph0le  
AA: h0wever y0u use an external appliance f0r y0ur time travel am i c0rrect   
TG: yeah turntables   
AA: i d0nt kn0w what th0se are but i imagine they are similar t0 what i used   
TG: okay cool  
TG: so maybe this wasnt an entirely shitty idea maybe you can actually give me decent advice  
TG: unless youre trolling the hell out of me and believe me i got my eye on you for that  
TG: taking me on a fucking rollercoaster up and down having the time of my goddamn life trusting every word out of your fangy alien mouth   
AA: im n0t lying  
AA: and i d0nt see the p0int 0f all this rambling r0leplay   
TG: fuck you honestly have no idea what a metaphor is do you  
TG: whatever ill get to the point  
TG: did you ever go forward   
AA: f0rward in time?   
TG: yeah skip to the end kind of shit   
AA: 0_0  
AA: myself n0  
AA: i had numer0us d00med selves wh0 did s0 h0wever  
AA: it was instrumental in the final battle  
AA: we never w0uld have succeeded had i n0t been there en masse t0 help battle the black king   
TG: wait shit  
TG: you said en masse so how many are we talking here  
TG: five ten   
AA: i c0uld n0t c0unt them all but there were at least several hundred   
TG: fuck me  
TG: that is a lot of dead daves  
TG: or whatever your name is  
TG: i mean dead selves are kind of the enemy you know   
AA: they served their purp0se   
TG: but didnt it sort of  
TG: i dont know  
TG: freak you out knowing all of them were out there  
TG: just cannon fodder  
TG: bodies for the fire  
TG: i mean its your life out there youre throwing away over and over  
TG: thats not some asshole  
TG: thats you dying  
TG: its not really the kind of crap you just sneeze at and walk away   
AA: i was 0kay with it  
AA: i see y0u are n0t and that is als0 0kay   
TG: hey im chill with pretty much anything im just saying  
TG: its kind of fucked up   
AA: yes a few 0f my teammates expressed that statement ab0ut it  
AA: t0 me it was simply the m0st l0gical way t0 address the situati0n  
AA: they were d00med anyway   
TG: but theyre people man  
TG: theyre you  
TG: i mean fuck  
TG: im not gonna just go to my death  
TG: im gonna go down fighting all the way  
TG: im gonna rock this fucking set and im not gonna leave until everyones ears are bleeding out from the cacophonous sick bassline  
TG: carve my goddamn red name in the games chest because dave fucking strider was here and he may have gone down but he still won  
TG: he still broke the game and got his friends through   
AA: 0_0  
AA: that s0unds 0ddly like a descripti0n 0f the fall 0f my cl0nes  
AA: perhaps we are n0t that different after all   
TG: like hell we arent  
TG: im not planning on throwing myself away over and over like you did  
TG: im fucking sick of that shit  
TG: i get enough of it in lohac   
AA: y0ure still l00king f0r a way t0 bend the rules  
AA: whether we utilize the same technique d0esnt change matters   
TG: yeah i guess  
TG: look can we not talk about dying anymore its sort of harshing my chill vibes   
AA: 0kay  
AA: dave i am sure y0ure d0ing fine as a time player  
AA: y0uve been bred f0r this task and its in y0ur veins   
TG: course it is   
AA: but if y0ure asking f0r advice i w0uld n0t suggest y0u simply 'skip t0 the end'  
AA: when y0u are meant t0 get there y0u will  
AA: and perhaps there will be m0re than 0ne 0f y0u t0 stand beside y0ur friends  
AA: its n0t s0mething y0u as the alpha self have t0 decide  
AA: it will be a ch0ice each d00med cl0ne will make f0r himself   
TG: yeah i guess  
TG: shit  
TG: you think well win   
AA: i havent been f0ll0wing al0ng   
TG: okay fair enough  
TG: well anyway thanks for the tips  
TG: youre kind of crappy at pep talks but thats not really what i was looking for  
TG: got to get back to being my super cool self running these stable time loops all over lohac and saving the goddamn universe  
TG: later

\-- turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering apocalypseArisen [AA] \--

Dave feels himself sag as he pulls the shades from his face. The lava is bright orange all around him and he digs his fingers into his eyes, rubbing and rubbing until stars start popping into his vision, and by then his jaw has set hard into something that probably looks like a grimace from the outside.

Damn. That hadn't been what he'd wanted to hear. He'd wanted to hear that the future was all sunshine and daisies and that sure, he could spin to the end and scope out what exactly goes down. He could totally plan endless loops that would make the final boss a cake walk. Instead he's apparently stuck in fucking lockstep, marching down the parade ground in constant 4/4 time and any step out of formation will trip up the whole damn show.

For a second it pulls his poker face out of whack. Part of him is intensely goddamn jealous because Rose has her magic and John has whatever the hell he has, and both of them are busy having the time of their lives playing around. They make a mistake and it's all golden. Start over from the top and try again. They don't have constant lives to save, always stumbling over their own corpse when they fail and watching themselves burn to death out in that fucking lava over and over.

They have it easy.

Dave doesn't have that cushion. All Dave has is time pressing in on him from all sides, squeezing the life out of him, and he's never been so tired before. So stressed. He stares down at the insides of his iShades, the lenses still glowing as he dangles them from his fingertips over this sulfur stink of the lava flow, and sometimes he just wants to throw in the towel and give up.

Go home. Take a nice long shower. Sleep for a week.

Get someone else to watch everyone's back for once.

Maybe that's selfish. Actually, it is pretty selfish considering the world is battered black and burning and there simply is no shower and no bed to go back to—no more apartment at all. No puppets and no games and no more of Bro's dubplates scattered all over the kitchenette, marked to hell in black magic marker at the samples he turns back to over and over again.

Now it's just Dave. And as tired as he is, he's still got marks on his records to tend to. He's still got a game to play and he's still got his friends' backs to watch, and like hell he's going to be caught lying down on the job. They need him. Besides, where would he be if it wasn't for everyone pulling him out of all those jams?

He blinks in the rising heat and slips his shades back on. Because they're going to fix this, and he is more than ready to rock this set to the end and go home a goddamn superstar.


End file.
